PJD, ISLAM, AND GOVERNANCE IN POST-2011 MOROCCO A.KADIR YILDIRIM, EDITOR CONTRIBUTORS Sarah J. Feuer, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy Lise Storm, University of Exeter, United Kingdom Driss Maghraoui, Al Akhawayn University, Ifrane, Morocco Beatriz Tomé-Alonso, University Loyola Andalucía, Seville, Spain Amina Drhimeur, CARPO, Bonn, Germany INTRODUCTION The Arab Spring protests in Morocco led by the February 20 Movement ushered in a new political era. An Islamist party—the Party of Justice and Development (PJD)—found an opportunity to be part of the government due to a series of constitutional reforms implemented in 2011. This was a momentous change in Moroccan politics that not only granted the PJD a chance to govern but also potentially tested the king’s religious credentials. Religion has always been a pillar of Morocco’s ruling Alaouite dynasty, which claims descent from the Prophet Muhammad. The king uses the title Amir al-Mu’minin (Commander of the Faithful) in order to confer religious legitimacy on his rule over Moroccans. The PJD derives part of its political identity from its Islamic orientation. This religious identity puts the party on a collision course with the king. Before the Arab uprisings began in Morocco, the PJD was effectively excluded from government despite its popularity and electoral success. Yet since the country’s constitutional reforms in 2011, the PJD has been the major partner of coalition governments in Morocco following parliamentary election victories in 2012 and 2016. The PJD’s ascent to government as a hitherto excluded political actor represents a step toward inclusionary politics in Morocco. As a political party with a significant electoral base, the PJD’s inclusion in the country’s political framework carries the promise of a more pluralistic political system. This report analyzes the dynamics of the PJD’s inclusion in Morocco’s changing political landscape and examines whether the promise of inclusive politics is borne out by the evidence. In doing so, it pays attention to the PJD’s relationship with the monarchy, its strategy to address constraints posed by the king, and its engagement with the electorate. Sarah Feuer’s brief, “Action and Reaction: Royal Rhetoric Responds to the PJD,” examines the monarchy’s response to the threat posed by the rise of the PJD as a major political actor by focusing on two distinct areas: political accountability and religion. The PJD’s self-identification as a party of reform with an Islamic orientation represents unique challenges to the monarchy’s traditional stance above the political fray and as the preeminent Islamic authority. In her analysis of the PJD’s potential as the standard-bearer of democratic governance in Morocco, Lise Storm offers a close look at the possible implications of such a role for the country’s gradual political liberalization. Storm’s brief “The PJD: The Vanguard of Democracy in Morocco in the Age of Populism and Authoritarian Entrenchment?” identifies the party’s strong popular base and its organizational prowess—rather than its Islamic identity or democratic credentials—as crucial assets as it aims to develop into the latest incarnation of a Moroccan democratic reform party. Driss Maghraoui’s brief “Working Under Constraints: The PJD in the aftermath of the 2016 Elections” examines the limits imposed on the PJD and its ability to govern. Maghraoui argues that such constraints are fundamentally very similar to those that held back political parties in previous governments and that aimed to thwart the prospects of reform in Morocco. Beatriz Tomé-Alonso offers a thorough analysis of the PJD’s approach to dealing with the highly restrictive governmental environment it has operated in since 2012. In “Party of Justice and Development: A Strategy of Differentiation,” Tomé-Alonso highlights the PJD’s efforts to survive by paying respect to the monarchy while simultaneously striving for political relevance among the electorate by emphasizing the party’s expertise, moral values, intra-party democratic processes, and communication strategy. Amina Drhimeur goes beyond the organizational and technical elements of the PJD’s strategy to remain relevant in the limited political framework allowed by the monarchy by detailing the policy initiatives employed by the party since its rise in government. In her brief “The Party of Justice and Development’s Pragmatic Politics,” Drhimeur argues that while the PJD’s appeal to voters beyond its core constituency— through a combination of neoliberal economic policies and social services—has helped the party at the polls and increased its popularity, such an appeal also carries the seeds of the party’s demise by weakening the king’s support. This report is based on “PJD, Islam, and Governance in Post-2011 Morocco,” a workshop held in Ifrane, Morocco, on February 20, 2018. It is part of a broader research project on “Building Pluralistic and Inclusive States Post-Arab Spring” that is supported by a grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. The workshop was hosted by Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane. A.Kadir Yildirim, Ph.D. Fellow, Center for the Middle East, Rice University’s Baker Institute Principal Investigator, “Building Pluralistic and Inclusive States Post-Arab Spring” ISSUE BRIEF 05.25.18 Action and Reaction: Royal Rhetoric Responds to the PJD Sarah J. Feuer, Ph.D., The Washington Institute for Near East Policy as mere instances of cosmetic change, INTRODUCTION Morocco’s contemporary history is replete In the heady days of early 2011, Morocco’s with examples of monarchs implementing King Mohammed VI responded to protests policy changes in an effort to fulfill their demanding jobs, political liberalization, and own rhetorical commitments or to fend an end to corruption by calling for a reform off opposition groups seeking to highlight process that would begin with revisions discrepancies between royal discourse and to the constitution and new elections. The action. Thus, the monarchy’s rhetorical resulting attenuation of the February 20 responses to the PJD’s rise are worth Movement, and the high participation examining, both for what they suggest rates in the ensuing July referendum and about the monarchy’s perception of its own November legislative elections, suggested vulnerabilities and because they ultimately the palace’s reaction to the initial unrest helped to frame the environment in which had convinced most Moroccans that the both the PJD and the regime could operate. monarchy understood the source of their This paper explores the monarchy’s grievances and intended to be a partner rhetorical responses to the PJD’s ascension in redressing them. By the winter of 2011, in two realms: political accountability and the regime appeared to have passed an religion. A concluding section considers important stress test. what these responses suggest about the The emergence But if the king had managed to evolving relationship between the monarchy of the Justice and puncture the protest movement and and Morocco’s leading Islamist party in the Development Party post-Arab Spring landscape. steer developments in a state-sanctioned (PJD) as the dominant direction, he soon faced another challenge player in parliament with the results of the November vote. POLITICAL ACCOUNTABILITY The emergence of the Justice and implied the palace Development Party (PJD) as the dominant Consistent with a key change introduced now had a companion, player in parliament—a body that had by the new constitution, one of the king’s and perhaps even a been emboldened, if modestly, by the first responses to the PJD’s 2011 electoral competitor, in the new constitution—implied the palace now victory was to appoint a representative of reform process it had a companion, and perhaps even a the leading party in parliament—as it turned competitor, in the reform process it sought out, the PJD’s Abdelilah Benkirane—as prime sought to lead. to lead. Notwithstanding the regime’s minister. The constitutional innovation of ostensible stability, the PJD’s rise did elicit Article 47 had sought to make Moroccan intriguing rhetorical responses from the governments more representative of the monarchy on a range of issues. While it can voting public, so the fact that the PJD be tempting to write off discursive shifts came to be associated with this increased RICE UNIVERSITY’S BAKER INSTITUTE FOR PUBLIC POLICY // ISSUE BRIEF // 05.25.18 representativeness was likely not lost on the of the Moroccan public following the monarchy. Following the PJD’s victory, royal 2011 protests. Still, the substantive rhetoric increasingly linked the matter of changes in royal rhetoric invoking popular political representation to accountability. representation and accountability suggest The king’s annual addresses to the a more targeted response to the PJD’s opening session of parliament have been ascension. For example, relative to their pre- revealing in this regard.1 In comparison 2011 variants, the annual speeches to the with the half-dozen years preceding the legislature since the PJD’s election victory PJD’s election victory, Mohammed VI’s have included more elaborate articulations speeches to the legislature since 2011 have of the need for a robust opposition in contained more elaborate references to parliament, implicitly conveying a desire to the responsibilities of parliamentarians— check the PJD’s power there. In 2006, the and especially of political parties—to the king briefly noted that elections citizenry, pointed critiques of the